The Secret of Barack Obama's Appeal

Right after the Mets collapsed down the stretch, I was watching ESPN throw it around to various baseball personalities who were explaining how sad and pathetic their swoon was (these same people, had the Mets won one more game, would be referring to the Mets as "resilient" and "gritty"). I can't remember which particularly blase personality was explaining that the Mets collapse was shameful and embarrassing, but he said something that stuck out to me.

Bland-o was saying that the Mets had to make changes, any changes, just because their fans needed to believe that this team could win next year, just because "change means hope." And suddenly Obama's appeal became clear to me.

I remembered growing up as a Sox fan and that complete sense of desperation that slowly crept over you each year as the team would flame out each September. The Yankees lead would be at two games, then three, then five, then seven, and the Indians would start to run away with the wildcard. And suddenly the season would be over, and there'd be that silence, that sad deadness that follows a season when you realize that despite all the time you'd spent convincing yourself that your team had what it took, deep down you always knew that they just weren't quite good enough to make it.

But then there'd be the postseason, and you'd start to believe again. The Sox would send a few prospects away for a talented-but-underachieving second baseman, and Nomar would start talking about how his wrist felt much stronger and he felt his power would be better this year, and all of a sudden no one could stop talking about how the big change was adding Dante Bichette or Shea Hillenbrand or Carl Everett or Reggie Jefferson or whoever our vain hope for that year was. It buoyed you, it brought the life back to talking about your team to friends and cashiers and homeless men on the street (don't ask). We'd believe, once again, that we'd made it over the edge, that we were deserving, that we were contenders, champions, that we had the trappings of greatness.

I think that's why it's so easy to believe in Obama. Nothing he's saying is anything new, it's all the same lines we've always heard. We see that he's clearly a politician through and through, he's strongly Democratic and almost never breaks with his party, he's just a less-experienced version of everything we've seen before, but... there's that newness to him. That sense of excitement. That feeling, creeping over you as you hear talk about him in coffee shop and in line at the supermarket: hey, this might be our year. This might be the time that everything changes. He's gonna be the guy who pushes us over the edge, pushes us to where we've always belonged. Pushes us to greatness. Believe it.

We know that it's probably not true, almost certainly not true, and we're fools for even thinking it. But we just want so badly to believe it, just for the sake of having hope again. We'd rather be fools blindly clinging to hope than doubters scoffing on the edges, we all would. And that's why we choose to believe in Obama.

The Best 5 Shows On Television

Patty asked me to rank the top five shows on television. At first I was torn between trying to decide between my favorite five shows and what I considered the best five shows, but it turned out not to be an issue. Times have changed, and the critical darlings that I appreciated but never managed to warm to ('The Sopranos,' 'The Wire') are now retired, leaving the difference between what I and admire the most and love the dearest completely negligible.

Also, I generally think that whatever I like is probably what’s best for America. Onward!

With apologies to: ‘The Office,’ ‘Family Guy,’ ‘Entourage,’ ‘House,’ ‘Flight of the Conchords,’ ‘The Colbert Report,’ and ‘Weeds.’

5. (tie) ‘Pushing Daisies' (ABC) and ‘Friday Night Lights.’ (NBC and DirectTV)
The two shows couldn’t be more different: one’s a fanciful, vibrant fairy tale about a man who can bring back the dead for 60 seconds, the other a cinéma vérité look at Texas high school football. A year ago it would’ve been FNL by a landslide (a year ago “Daisies’ wasn’t on the air yet, so I guess the point is moot), but FNL’s second season maintained its excellent direction and writing but lost narrative direction, to say the least – by the end of the season, it was inexplicably a show about girl’s volleyball. Still, hope springs eternal, and with promise by its creators of better focus this year, it remains a top-five show. Meanwhile, ‘Daisies’ remains the most original show on broadcast television – a little Harry Potter, a little Amelie, all in sparkling highly saturated color. Extra points for breakout stars Anna Friel and Houston’s own Lee Pace

4. 'Californication.' (Showtime)
This one was a shock to me, but Showtime’s rather purple take on a struggling writer’s attempt to win back his ex-wife turned out to be one of the best shows I watched last year. David Duchovny found a role that fits him even better than Fox Mulder – as Hank Moody, he’s profane, narcissistic, and vicious, yet in a quiet, self-loathingly Zen-like manner that seems almost admirable. The James Dean of failing authors. Having a show on HBO or Showtime is often a boon – the shows spend more money over less episodes in order to keep quality high, and on shows like this one, it’s definitely clear that the strategy is working.

3. 'Mad Men.' (AMC)
Brilliant and verbose, with picture perfect culture landmarks to envelop the viewer into the world of advertising in the 1960’s, ‘Mad Men’ is everything to me that ‘Sopranos’ never could be – quiet, slowly developing, completely gripping intrigue. John Hamm is perfection as Don Draper – a dapper, self-absorbed yet completely brilliant ad exec – somehow managing to win the affection of the audience while holding them off with one hand. By the end of the first season, you feel that you both barely know him and know him better than he knows himself. Remarkable that this is AMC’s first ever narrative show.

2. 'Lost.' (ABC)
We have now crossed the threshold completely – after a below-par second season and an up-and-down third, ‘Lost’ broke out and completely reinvented itself, moving the narrative so quickly that the show has become a tornado of half-answered questions and dizzying plot devices. You are either entranced or you’ve given up completely, and I find myself in the first category. One way or another, the series finale will almost certainly be one of the most debated and rehashed television events of my generation.

1. '30 Rock.' (NBC)
Both one of the most sharply written and consistently funny shows on television, they have with their triumphant Emmy sweep now become its standard bearer for comedy. Somehow managing to be both NBC’s signature comedy (even over ‘The Office’) and yet remain a cult show (low ratings will do that to you), ’30 Rock’ seems willing to go anywhere for a laugh – the ensemble cast appears and disappears without conscience, only appearing if they actually fit into a storyline, a decidedly original strategy for sitcom television. Throw in virtually every good celebrity cameo on television this year – 7 out of the 11 nominees for Best Guest Actor or Actress in a Comedy Series were from ’30 Rock’ – and the selection’s a lock.

Take THAT, McCain.

I'm not in favor of the phrase "pork-barrel" spending. I just think it sounds too tasty. I understand that it's actually an old pre-Civil War custom where owners would give their slaves a barrel of pork and let them fight over it, but to me it seems like the sort of thing that I would eat at a Renaissance Fair (apologies, Renaissance Faire). As in, "whenever you've finished your honeyed mead, Jim, I'd like to go and get some rinds out of the pork barrel before the joust." It could even be the name of a really good backwoods BBQ joint, The Pork Barrel, famed for its unbelievably juicy ribs and how the log floor creaks alarmingly when you walk on it.

The sign would unquestionably be a picture of a pig with a barrel for a midsection, and the pig would have cartoon eyes and be smiling.

Update: I found a Pork Barrel Restaurant, but unbelievably, it serves seafood and seems to have no sort of homegrown charm about it.